Thursday, May 5, 2011

Light wind - lovely!

Missed a great session yesterday - saw the joy on the webcam when I got home from hockey at 5pm :( - but the forecast was for more of the same today!

Fail. We got less :(

Luckily, I'm the proud owner of a 19m Speed2 Silver Arrow and a Flydoor so I actually got some riding in! Kept losing ground downwind cos I was jumping and fooling around, but eventually the wind picked up just a touch more (it was 4-7 knots when I unpacked the kite) and I was going upwind finally! Had some fun for a bit then was just starting to feel overpowered at full trim so thought I'd go back to the 16m Crossbow - I had pumped it up already, after all ...

... hmm, just powered. Had some fun playing silly buggers like I don't dare with the foil, pulled off some nice jumps and even some (intentional) aerial transitions! Getting real good at the down loop carve turn too :D

Was a bit crowded and there were a few close calls.

[rant]

The Mistress of Disaster - what a bitch! Everyone walks all the way up the beach, waits to get into the water and start in the order they arrived - but not her, she's got to jump in just downwind of you, fuck around for a few minutes holding you up before diddling off. She does the reverse when you're trying to walk up the beach too. And she never N-E-V-E-R looks behind herself when she fucking turns! She nearly flew into me yet again.

Boofhead the Huncback - likes to trample your lines into the sand and stand over your kite smoking, flicking burning ash all over it. Also has no idea about the water code - I was on a starboard tack, he was coming at me with his kite at or above 45° and would have gotten tangled in my lines if neither of us moved. He didn't even move his kite so at the last minute I dove my kite and went to head downwind of him - grr! - and as I did that, he started a turn by diving his kite so I had to whip my kite back to port and continue my bearing off as a heel to toe turn. Moron.

SeaSpecs - DON'T fucking float, unless you consider bricks to float. 3 pairs now at the bottom of Biwa, 2 pairs had been tied to my wetsuit pull cord ... in the milliseconds that I splash down and pop my head back up, they're fucking gone to the bottom like a rocket. Debating what to do about new pair of glasses ...

[/rant]

Despite that, had a good day playing with the low wind. Praise the lord - or Ricardo! - for the Flydoor, what a great board! And the Silberpfeil made the most of the utter butter water we had for the first 2 hours ... OMG flat water riding at last!

What I learned today ...
• SeaSpecs do NOT float ... Ffffff uuuuuuuuuuuuu ...
• Am very happy I didn't buy a Naish Cult - the dude out on the 15 had to swim in TWICE cos it simply wouldn't relaunch - even from T.E. down :o Not an unusual occurrence! The F-One's don't relaunch so well in light wind either ...
• When I've trimmed in the Silberpfeil about 1/2, I could be having great fun on the Crossbow. A smaller board will mix it all up though :D
• SA2.5 overlaps perfectly with the 16 'bow but is a PITA to pack up in a hurry!
• Don't pack it up wingtip to wingtip but rather roll one end to the center, then the other. A little more time consuming but zero SPL or bridle tangles ...

No comments:

Post a Comment